MEN'S LACROSSE: Strong Offense Puts Harvard on Brink of Ivy Crown

The 2011 season was filled with a myriad of highs and lows for Harvard men’s lacrosse.

The team finished the year ranked No. 14 in the country, and its 10 wins were the most by a Crimson squad since 1998.

But at the same time, the season left an aura of unfulfilled potential.

And at the end of the day, Harvard continued to come up just short.

After barely losing numerous games during the regular season, the Crimson finished runner-up in the Ivy League, and just missed out on an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.

The year started with a home win over Canisius and a loss at Hofstra, the nation’s fifth-ranked team at the time.

Harvard then swept three consecutive home games against then-No. 20 Georgetown, Bellarmine, and Holy Cross, and won a big road contest at Brown. At 5-1 and ranked No. 17 in the country, the Crimson was off to its best start since 2000.

Then came the mid-season swoon. Harvard lost a heartbreaker at the buzzer to Dartmouth, and after a comeback victory over then-No. 16 UMass, the team dropped two more one-goal games in succession—12-11 to Albany and 13-12 to then-No. 6 Cornell—blowing late leads in each.

After beating Quinnipiac, the Crimson then suffered its most devastating defeat yet, a 7-6 loss in double overtime to then-No. 15 Penn.

But at the end of the season, Harvard turned it on again, emerging victorious in must-win Ivy contests at Princeton and versus then-No. 14 Yale on senior day to earn the third seed in the Ancient Eight tournament.

“We started coming together and playing well as a team, which led to our success at the end of the year,” freshman Daniel Eipp said. “Midseason, we had a little slump since we weren’t playing our game, but we were able to win some key games down the stretch.”

In the tournament’s first round, the Crimson got its revenge on the Quakers, dominating then-No. 15 Penn en route to a 12-8 win.

But in the championship at No. 2 Cornell, Harvard fell apart in the third quarter and couldn’t recover, losing by a score of 15-6.

With a win in any of its one-loss Ivy defeats, the Crimson would have likely earned an at-large bid to the 16-team NCAA Tournament. Instead, Harvard ended up widely considered to be the “last team out,” and the season was suddenly over.

But on the whole, it was a successful first year for rookie coach Chris Wojcik ’96, who took the reins of the Crimson after serving as an assistant at Penn and brought a new, fast-paced offensive system with him.

“He really gets what it’s about,” senior midfielder Andrew Parchman said. “[The coaching transition] was pretty seamless. Obviously, it took a while to learn the new schemes, terminology, offensive and defensive plans and the like, but things came out pretty well."

“As he gets more familiar with the players and the players get more familiar with him, it’s only going to breed more success,” Parchman added.

The Crimson earned numerous individual accolades during the year as well.

Harvard was led by its co-captains, senior Dean Gibbons and junior Kevin Vaughan, who both were named to the All-Ivy first team. Gibbons was seventh in the country with 3.79 points per game and tenth with 1.86 assists per game. He paced the Crimson in those two categories—finishing with the ninth-most points in Harvard history—while also scoring 30 goals, one fewer than the team-leader, junior attack Jeff Cohen. Vaughan ranked third on the squad with 19 tallies and 27 points.

The Crimson also received a strong rookie performance from Eipp, whose 16 scores tied him for fourth on the team with sophomore Ryan Stevens. The freshman was named the NEILA Rookie of the Year, and earned All-Ivy honorable mention status along with junior defenseman Paul Pate, who led a defense that improved as the season went on in front of sophomore goaltender Harry Krieger.

But in the end, the desired level of success was not obtained.

“We set out some goals for the team—to win the Ivy League championship and make it to the NCAA Tournament—so we definitely came up short,” Eipp says. “We weren’t happy in that way, but we set a good ground for the upcoming season, and we have a lot to build off and look forward to next year.”

—Staff writer Scott A. Sherman can be reached at ssherman13@college.harvard.edu.